A TASTE OF MAINE BIRCH. 135 



indescribably ancient and unfamiliar. Out of this 

 mould, that might have come from the moon, or the 

 interplanetary spaces, were growing mountain cran- 

 berries and blueberries, or huckleberries. We were 

 soon so absorbed in gathering the latter that we were 

 quite oblivious of the grandeurs about us. It is these 

 blueberries that attract the bears. In eating them, 

 Uncle Nathan said, they take the bushes in their 

 mouths, and by an upward movement strip them 

 clean of both leaves and berries. We were con- 

 stantly on the lookout for the bears, but failed to see 

 any. Yet a few days afterward, when two of our 

 party returned here and encamped upon the moun- 

 tain, they saw five during their stay, but failed to get 

 a good shot. The rifle was in the wrong place each 

 time. The man with the shot-gun saw an old bear 

 and two cubs lift themselves from behind a rock and 

 twist their noses around for his scent, and then shrink 

 away. They were too far off for his buckshot. I 

 must not forget the superb view that lay before us, 

 a wilderness of woods and waters stretching away to 

 the horizon on every hand. Nearly a dozen lakes and 

 ponds could be seen, and in a clearer atmosphere the 

 foot of Moosehead Lake would have been visible. 

 The highest and most striking mountain to be seen 

 was Mount Bigelow, rising above Dead River, far to 

 the west, and its two sharp peaks notching the hori- 

 zon like enormous saw-teeth. We walked around and 

 viewed curiously a huge bowlder on the top of the 

 mountain that had been split in two vertically, and 



